Mi nueva familia

Instead of packing one post full of information about different things, I am going to write a series of entries on specific topics—the first being my host family.

I don’t think I could have gotten a better placement for these first three months in terms of compatibility. It is a really good balance between having some privacy and personal space and getting to interact with a very warm and friendly family. My family consists of Doña L. (the mother) and her 16-year-old daughter sharing the house with her sister and her twenty-something daughter.

Our house is located on the edge of town. It is a simple construction of brick walls covered in plaster with a tin roof. As to PC stipulations, I have my own room. Both Doña L. and her sister have their own kitchen and living areas but share the bathroom and the pila. Usually made of concrete and located either inside or just outside the home (ours is concrete and inside), the pila is comparable to a sink in the US. It consists of three separate compartments, the middle one for holding water, and is used for washing clothes and dishes. We have running water but only for a couple of hours after 6 pm and some days not at all. During the time the water is working, Doña L. fills the middle pila basin, a huge plastic container next to the pila, and a handful of plastic tubs for bathing, cooking, and flushing the toilet.

Bucket bathing it will be for the next three months (maybe more). I was first introduced to the bucket bath during my travels in Africa. For the uninitiated, the process simply consists of scooping water out of a large plastic container with a smaller one, splashing it on your body, soaping up, and splashing on more to rinse. Washing hair is the tricky part, as it is a bit difficult to get all the shampoo out (I have ceased conditioning). The only slightly unpleasant thing about bucket bathing is that it can be quite cold. My village is located above 7000 feet in the mountains and the evenings and mornings are pretty brisk (I sleep in a sweatshirt and long pants with a couple of blankets), so even though I use water heated on the stove, the surrounding air makes it a chilly experience. Every morning at approximately 5:40 am, Doña L. yells, “Kaaati, su agua está liiisto!” This is my wake-up call announcing that my hot water is ready for bathing. It is always delivered with the ‘Kati’ and the ‘listo’ drawn out (for Spanish speakers, I thought going by Katarina here would be easier to pronounce, but little did I know that Kati, which sounds like ‘Kathy’ is a commonly used nickname…I hate being called Kathy).

One of my favorite things about my living situation is that being on the outskirts of town, my house is surrounded by little fields of vegetables. Doña L. grows mainly lettuce, but also some güicoy and beets (only my family would appreciate the irony in the fact that I helped Doña L. gather beets the other day) to sell in the market in the capital. There is a variety of trees by the house: lime, orange, and peach (two varieties that are much smaller than the ones found in the states). Doña L. also has a handful of beautiful rose bushes that produce flowers year round and some other vegetable plants that I am not quite sure what they are yet.

Families that host volunteers are given a stipend by Peace Corps. This money goes to providing us meals (I am planning a whole post on food in the future), lodging and doing our laundry. Having lived alone for while, it is a bit of adjustment getting used to having someone cook, clean my room, and wash my clothes for me. Another major adjustment is the restriction on being able to leave the house alone after dark, especially since the sun goes down around 6:30. According to the other volunteers with whom I have spoken, this seems to be a pretty much across the board family rule. Even though Doña L. says that my village is not at all dangerous (“Gracious a Dios!”), and she often goes out alone at night, I think he is just overly cautious about my safety (like PC in general).

The host family situations in which volunteers have been placed really run the gamut–anywhere from having private bathrooms with hot running water (like Kelly my village mate), to sharing one bathroom with 13 family members, to having to use an outdoor latrine. And even though my home is pretty basic, I think it is the perfect placement for me and expect an enjoyable three months here with my Gutemaltecan family.